Author of Horror / Speculative Fiction

Discipline

Secondly, here’s how I’ve been spending my time: Apart from being sick early last week (which really took the wind from my sails for a few days), and recovering from said sickness, I’ve been doing a whole lot of relaxation. Yes, you read that correctly. Todd Keisling is actually trying to relax for once. I can be a very uptight person, sometimes to very unhealthy levels, and it’s been such a relief not spending my evenings in front of a computer screen.

Writing by hand has liberated me from the computer. Yeah, it’s moving slowly, but this slow-down is great because it forces me to really think about what I’m trying to say or accomplish. This is how I should’ve written the novel in the first place. All in all, I’ve got about 40 pages filled in my notebook. There are 240 sheets. A sixth of the book is full. I went ahead and bought another one just so I wouldn’t have to interrupt myself when I inevitably reach the end. I have no idea what my word count is, or how those written pages equate to typed pages, nor do I care. I’m simply writing at my own leisure, and I’m loving every minute of it.

Aside from writing, I’ve been doing a little reading courtesy of the local library, as well as taking in some movies and enjoying some video games. I got Viva Pinata for Erica as an early birthday present, and now we have to schedule our time at the Xbox.

Unfortunately, there’s not much else going on here. I thought about typing up the first chapter of imagiNATION and putting it here, but I think it’s for the best that I don’t. I know there are a couple of you who are eager to read it, but I can’t compromise the mojo, so I’m afraid you’ll have to wait. In the meantime, I’ve a few things to post here that should keep you occupied. (These are things I’ve been hoarding over the last few weeks with the intention of posting at some point – I guess we’ve reached that vague point now, huh? And so I begin the “closing of the tabs” as Mr. Gaiman refers to it.)

Call for Submissions: Ghosts in the Machine – (via FictionScribe) The deadline for this contest is June 1st, and it involves (as you’ve probably guessed) the supernatural in technology. There’s a 1k-7k word window, and acceptance means publication in an anthology, publication credit and $20. Who can say no to $20? I’ll be submitting one of my own stories for this one. I suggest you all do the same.

Call for Submissions: Masques – (via FictionScribe) The deadline for this one is October 20th, so you’ve got some time. It’s looking for speculative fiction that does not exceed 5k words. Details are in the link.

Call for Unpublished Writers – (via FictionScribe) A lot of you should enter this one. There’s a 3k-5k word window, and the deadline is December 1st, so you have plenty of time. All entries should involve tales from Assyrian mythology (i.e. Gilgamesh). (My buddy Phill will kill me for linking to Wikipedia)

Finally, this last point of interest has nothing to do with writing, but it’s still really cool so I’m going to post it anyway. As most of you are aware, I’m a huge fan of Nine Inch Nails (I probably wouldn’t be writing today if it wasn’t for Reznor’s music), and this past week saw the release of their latest album, The Slip, for free. Yes, as in, no money, no DRM, no shenanigans. You can download the whole thing right here. Since it’s been released under a Creative Commons license, I’m free to upload it to my own media player, and so I’ll be doing just that today, so if you haven’t heard it yet and don’t feel like downloading it to your hard drive (for whatever weird reason), you can listen to it here.

On a side note: I’ve been listening to the album while writing every day this week, and I have to admit that, for all its abrasive noise, it certainly gets the creativity flowing.

Well, I think that’s about it. I’ll try not to take so long between posts, but I can’t promise anything.

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4 thoughts on “Discipline”

I think it’s really cool you’re doing the rewrite by hand. A handwritten copy of your book will be a very cool thing to have in your possession, not to mention it’ll be worth a shitload once you’re famous (and dead – make sure it goes into good hands, haha).Good luck with it!

Good to hear you’re enjoying yourself, Todd. We all take ourselves a little too seriously, or at the very least driver ourselves a little too hard sometimes. I’ve downloaded the new NIN album, but I haven’t got around to listening to it yet so we’ll see how that goes. It’s likely not going to be any YZ, but any NIN is good NIN.

Relaxation is good!
I wish I could say I’m making progress typing the novel, but I’ve hit a couple walls and am not using time as well as I should.

You know, it feels good to note that I’ve read about half of those cult book picks. Funny that so many were popular w/the hippie crowd, including the Rand. I wonder what happened to my copy of Siddhartha….